This week, the ladies finish their tour of Dubai, and it’s a lonely place for Lydia Schiavello on the Real Housewives of Melbourne.

As the sun rises over Dubai, we’re still raw from the confrontation between Lydia and Chyka and Jackie. Pettifleur knows what it’s like to be singled out by the group, so she has come to comfort her ersatz friend.

Lydia is cowering in her ivory tower, and has somehow come to the conclusion that, because Jackie brought it up – she is to blame for Chyka’s animosity towards her. Not anything to do with the alleged rumours she has spread around Melbourne. Pettifleur’s more than willing to jump on the latest bandwagon against Jackie, but still tries to draw out of Lydia what she thinks they’re anger is based in.

Lydia continues to play dumb, and deflects again by making a big song and dance about how upset she is because Chyka’s upset (again, because of Jackie) and she wants to resolve it with Chyka to soothe her own ego. Lydia’s sick of being picked on, she says, but under it all I’m sure she’s loving the cameras focused on her.

Moving on, Chyka has organized a jewellery shopping afternoon in the Bridge Suite penthouse – thereby satisfying the final clause in the promotional contract between Foxtel and The Atlantis at The Palm.

All the girls, minus Pettifleur and Lydia, meet up and start to chat about how Chyka’s feeling. Chyka’s not ready to talk to Lydia about it, she just wants to enjoy what’s left of the trip without a messy confrontation – and the rest of the group largely support her, with Jackie flat out refusing to back Lydia’s version of events of not knowing what she’s said.

The lady of the hour arrives, and you could cut the atmosphere with a special atmosphere cutter. Lydia’s even wearing the same kaftan as Chyka, but she can barely muster up a brief mention of it – without even looking her in the eye. Even Pettifleur gets a warm reception, which must be nice for her in this group.

The jewellery sales assistant comes in to throw some numbers around of some tchotchkes that these women have no business buying, but Lydia is still super focused on getting back into Chyka’s good graces. She awkwardly sidles up to her and asks to chat, but Chyka shuts it down: wrong time, wrong place.

Next, it’s Pettifleur’s turn to go into bat for Lydia. She goes up to Jackie and asks her, plain and simple, does she feel responsible for bringing it up at dinner? Jackie says absolutely not, and wonders why Pettifleur even cares so much.

Lydia comes to sit down, in hopes of tackling the issue head on, but Jackie won’t give her the satisfaction of a confrontation. She gets up and leads Chyka away from Pettifleur and Lydia. What follows is a weird cat and mouse around the small living room with Jackie and Lydia sniping at each other. Chyka finally calls for calm, and says that she’ll address it when she’s ready and for everyone to shutup about it.

The ladies all head out to the terrace, which has a panoramic view of Dubai, but Chyka and Jackie are still fuming about Lydia. And as the sands swirl through the last, lazy beams of sunlight – we say goodbye to this seasons Housewives vacation.

Back in Melbourne, Janet is meeting with Brian to finally find out where their relationship is going. They’re still married on paper, and Brian is keen to come back into the marital unit. Janet, however, is more cautious; if they were to reconcile, but broke up again down the line, the effect on those around them would be even more devastating than the first time. It’s a sad conclusion to the Brian and Janet saga, but as they kiss and walk in opposite directions at the end of the night, I’m sure we’ll see Brian again, ready with another anecdote about handjobs.

Over in the CBD, Jackie and International Rock Star Ben Gillies are at the fertility clinic to find out if everything’s in order for them to have children in the near future. Jackie’s worried that she’s left it too late to start having children, even though her spiritual side says she’ll be fine. Also, Ben calls his sperm ‘swimmers’ which, grow up.

While Ben gets a wristy from Jackie and tries to aim into a cup, we go across to a funky restaurant in St Kilda, where Janet and Gina have decided to stage an intervention with Lydia to try and mend her relationship with the group.

Janet is there first, and when Lydia arrives, she decides to just lay it out that Lydia needs to stop denying that she hasn’t said anything malicious or she’s going to just keep digging the hole deeper and deeper until it caves in on her.

When Gina arrives, she confirms what Janet’s been saying, saying that Lydia has even spread rumours to her; and she’s a fool if she thinks this isn’t going to come back and bite her squarely on the bum.

They have a bit of a yell about why it’s so important that Lydia cop to it (i.e. the ladies have no trust in her anymore), but Lydia just stands up, says ‘I have to go’ and walks straight out. No, no – dig up, stupid!

Oh, well. Back at the baby-making clinic, Jackie and Ben have had their physicals and await the results. Both of them are predictably nervous, so thankfully the doctor says that both of them have the right ingredients to have a little Jackie or little International Rock Star Ben Gillies. I’m happy for them and hopefully they can have a baby to continue the royal bloodline of Newcastle, so Svetlana, Empress of the Central Coast and New England, can finally retire to their country estate in Armidale.

Speaking of mothers, Lina is over at Lydia’s house to abuse Figaro and Johanna simultaneously. Lydia’s brother John also gets there, and they start to plan Lina’s upcoming birthday. Her mum wants a theme, so Lydia forcefully suggests ‘Capri’ even though their mother is a Sicilian, not a Capresi. But, as Linkin Park taught us, in the end, nothing really matters; so they all laugh, and we keep our backs to the wall and slowly edge our way out of the room.

Over at Gina’s house, it’s the latest episode of ‘The Gina Liano Variety Hour’, a show where we entertain Gina’s latest boondoggle because she’s anchoring this entire damn show. She’s sitting down with ‘Holistic life coach’ (ugh) Teymara Antonio-Wright, a woman who looks like the second understudy to play Grandmama Addams, in order to sort out her life as she plans to launch her fragrance Gina by Chemist Warehouse.

Teymara is a ‘celebrity astrologer/life coach’ who has a column in OK! Magazine, if you needed any reassurance of her qualifications. Gina asks for advice on how to deal with her newfound national fame, so Teymara uses this opportunity to use Lionel Richie as a reference point for EVERYTHING. Lionel does this, Lionel does that, when I was on tour with Lionel, Lionel, Lionel, Lionel.

Gina decides to tune out and talk about how many followers she has on Twitter or Instagram, so it ends up just being two women ranting by themselves about their own egos.

Anyway, Chyka has invited everyone along to the opening of The Glasshouse, Collingwood FC’s newest event space, courtesy of Eddie McGuire and their company, The Big Group.

The girls, minus hostess Chyka, all grab a glass of champagne for cocktail hour and the hot topic is whether Lydia will bring up anything with Chyka tonight. Lydia says that she’s texted Chyka and at least opened a dialogue, but the other ladies are quick to call her out on it, saying that they’ve spoken to Chyka who hasn’t mentioned anything about it.

Pettifleur decides to intervene, and points out that Jackie started all this – which gets Jackie’s goat in a big way. Everyone decides to go in on Pettifleur, she doesn’t know what she’s defending Lydia for, and so she shouldn’t speak on the matter. Lydia is noticeably quiet as Pettifleur once again steps up to defend her, and Pettifleur certainly notices – she starts to question why she defends Lydia, when Lydia is not as forthcoming with her support.

Thankfully, Chyka arrives and gives everyone a kiss and a hug, but Jackie is quick to pull her away to ask her whether Lydia has spoken to her. Chyka denies that Lydia has spoken to her, and Jackie gets her validation that Lydia is still lying. Bully for her, then.

Everyone goes in to the dining room and Gamble and Gina are seated together, having a gay old time, Lucy and Ethel back together again – but across the table, Pettifleur and Lydia are icy, with Pettifleur feeling like Lydia didn’t back her up when she went in to defend her.

Lydia thinks that it’s a different style of defending, one that she doesn’t necessarily agree with all the time, but Pettifleur thinks that even if she doesn’t like it, she could at least show up to cheer her on. Pettifleur is hurt that Lydia can raise her voice to scold her, but never to support her, and questions whether Lydia is a true friend.

This is the last straw for Lydia. She goes off at Pettifleur, yelling at her, calling her ‘a f***ing idiot’ and a ‘fool’, and finally telling her to ‘f*** off.’

Pettifleur gets very upset and runs off crying, while the other ladies wonder why Lydia has just decided to become an island unto herself, sending her one cheerleader off in tears. And that’s it, the episode ends.

Next week, all of this nonsense comes to an end in the finale! Something is rotten in the state of Lydia as everyone’s problems come to a head. See you then!